


A Coalition Engineered

by amtrak12



Series: change the currents [4]
Category: Doctor Who (1963), Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Rewrite, Gen, Mentions of Death, POV Martha Jones, Season 4 AU, acknowledges that Martha and her family experienced some trauma in S3, but is not a deep dive on ptsd or trauma by any means, references the tie-in novel At Childhood's End but does not contain plot spoilers, set pre-Turn Left, step one in my long-term plan to have Martha work at A Charitable Earth, the fam are mentioned so slight spoilers for ep 11x01
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-13
Updated: 2020-09-13
Packaged: 2021-03-06 18:47:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 10,498
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26443660
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amtrak12/pseuds/amtrak12
Summary: These days, Martha Jones refuses to be frightened of anything the universe might throw at her -- even an unexpected meeting with Rose Tyler. But when Rose shares news of a looming crisis that may threaten Martha's family, Martha will do whatever it takes to secure their safety.A sequel to "change the currents of our lives".
Relationships: Martha Jones & Ace | Dorothy McShane, Martha Jones & Rose Tyler
Series: change the currents [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1899652
Comments: 5
Kudos: 34





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I bet you 10 bucks if you ask Russell T. Davies in 2020 to name each member of Martha's family, he couldn't do it.
> 
> The death warning is for the middle/middle-end of this chapter. An alien family (parents and children) died off-camera in a spaceship crash. No gory details or anything, but the tragedy is humanized and empathized with so skim or skip what you need to.

Dr. Martha Jones, UNIT’s resident medical specialist who had travelled all through time and space meeting Shakespeare and staring down Daleks, paced anxiously at the doors of UNIT’s Cardiff office. The call from Donna couldn’t have come at a worse time. This was the second day of what was supposed to be just a two day trip. She had finished the final autopsies that morning. An hour of paperwork and she would've been on the road back home to London, making plans for a relaxing evening with her fiance Tom. For weeks, his hours at the hospital hadn't lined up with her UNIT work, and now with her pending move, they needed the chance to reconnect.

No, not reconnect. They weren't disconnected. They’ve just been missing each other. And she wasn’t anxious either. After a year spent watching the Toclafane and the Master terrorize the Earth, what could possibly be left out there that could scare her? 

Torchwood’s black SUV finally pulled up by the door, but it wasn’t the familiar figure of Jack or Gwen or Ianto who climbed out of the driver’s side. It was a young white woman unfamiliar in every way except for her blonde hair.

Rose Tyler.

Martha shoved down her resurgence of nerves and opened the door. “Did you find the place okay?”

_Oh, good one, Martha. What are you going to do next: ask her about the traffic?_

“Yeah, it was fine.” Rose gestured back at the SUV. “Have you ever driven one of those before?”

Martha glanced at the vehicle. “An SUV or a Torchwood kitted out car?”

“Either. It’s bloody terrifying,” Rose said. “I can’t decide if I should have taken a cab here or insisted Mickey let me drive more often.”

Martha had no idea who Mickey was or where to take a conversation about driving, so she simply said, “Well, you made it, at least.”

She stepped back to allow Rose inside and examined the woman as she passed by. She was blonde, like Jack had said. Dyed blonde, though, which made Martha want to roll her eyes. She was a bit taller than Martha and seemed a bit younger, too. Certainly, she didn’t carry any heavy burdens on her shoulders. The Doctor’s perfect Rose suddenly back from a parallel world and now standing inside UNIT.

“So,” Rose said as she finished taking in the military sparse lobby, “I assume you’re Martha?”

“Yes, sorry. Dr. Martha Jones.” Martha said and held out her hand.

“Rose Tyler.” With a smile, Rose returned the handshake.

“It’s nice to meet you.”

“Yeah, you too,” Rose said. “Donna’s been telling me about you.”

“Donna has?” Martha raised her eyebrows. Not the Doctor -- Donna. Of course. Why would the Doctor mention her to Rose? It wasn’t like she was important.

“The Doctor has too, of course,” Rose added. “But it’s, you know, Donna, so the occasional remark has been about all he’s gotten in.” She chuckled. “I think he’s finally found someone with a bigger gob than his.”

Rose was nervous too. The realization shot alarm through Martha. There was no reason for Rose to be nervous about this meeting unless she had been told everything -- including about Martha falling in love with the Doctor.

_Fuck me. He’s all Rose this and Rose that without ever giving details, yet he has no problem spilling my entire life story to everyone he sees?_

“It’s okay.” Martha forced a smile. “I’ve heard about you, too.”

Awkwardness filled the room with silence, but Martha was a professional now. She pulled a clip-on badge from her pocket and pushed through the awkwardness.

“Here’s your visitor’s badge,” she said.

Rose accepted it and clipped it to her jacket.

Martha continued, “Cardiff isn’t my normal station so I don’t really have an office here, but I think I know someone’s we can borrow.”

She led the way through the halls. The handful of scientists who were stationed in Cardiff were still out examining the crash site. That left the offices nearest the morgue currently empty.

“Where is your normal station?” Rose asked as they walked.

“London for a while, but as of Monday, it’s New York City,” Martha said. “My flight leaves Friday.”

“New York? Does UNIT have bases all over, then?”

“Just about.” Martha led them into a shared office where they’d have two chairs to use and shut the door.

“Friday’s three days away, isn’t it?” Rose asked. “What brought you to Cardiff when you’re moving so soon?”

Rose needing to clarify the days until Friday reminded Martha that Rose was keyed into the Tardis’s time, not Earth’s. It left a slight ache in Martha’s chest. She missed travelling on the Tardis -- sometimes.

“A small spacecraft crashed nearby. They found four bodies, so they called me in to do the autopsies.”

“What spacecraft?” Rose asked.

“Alien, but otherwise, they’re not sure, yet,” Martha said. “That’s not why you’re here, though, is it? Donna said the emergency was about reality ending.”

“Yeah, it’s called a reality bomb. It's happening in two weeks, but we don’t know who’s causing it.”

“Two weeks?” That was more warning than the Doctor typically gave, yet it also was much closer than Martha had been expecting. The confirmation that the threat was indeed to reality wasn’t comforting either. She’d been hoping Donna was exaggerating.

“That’s two weeks in the Doctor’s timeline,” Rose said. “We’re hoping it’ll be longer on Earth. I have Torchwood in my parallel world trying to track down when the first star disappeared to see if we can get an exact date.”

“Wait, stars are disappearing too?”

Rose nodded and then explained the situation from the beginning. Time passed faster on the parallel world she had been trapped in, so that world was a year into the future. There was a Torchwood on that side too, and for months they had been seeing stars disappear one-by-one. Then, the walls between the universes began to collapse which is how Rose had made it back to the Doctor.

“How do you know this is all caused by a reality bomb?” Martha asked.

“While I was searching for the Doctor, I ended up in the future,” Rose said.

“And in that future, you didn’t learn what a reality bomb actually was or who caused it?”

Rose shook her head. “I wasn’t in the universe’s future. I mean I was by like a century, but…. I ended up in the Doctor’s future, and it was that Doctor that called it a reality bomb.”

Martha raised her eyebrows. “Okay.”

She should ask more questions about the reality bomb, but now she had more pressing questions about this future Doctor. Too many questions, in fact; she didn’t know where to begin.

Rose must have sensed this because she gave her a wry smile and said, “I know, right? It was so weird.”

“How far into his future did you go?” Martha asked.

“About two thousand years.”

“You’re kidding!”

“No, I wish.”

Martha had seen the end of the universe a hundred trillion years into the future, but somehow picturing the Doctor two thousand years older was harder to wrap her mind around.

“What was the Doctor even like two thousand years in the future?”

“Very different,” Rose said with the weight of someone who didn’t want to answer follow-up questions.

“And the future Doctor didn’t tell you anything more?”

“Couldn’t. Had to protect this timeline,” Rose said. “Whatever it is, though, we managed to stop it once before.”

“We did? When?”

“In that Doctor’s past.” Rose grimaced. “It gets a bit complicated here. You know how the timelines can change based on the choices we make?”

“I guess, yeah.”

“Well, that Doctor had made two thousand years worth of choices,” Rose said, “and the changes have echoed back to us.”

“You mean... there’s two versions of this timeline now and we’re on the changed one?”

“The Doctor would probably ramble on about ghost timelines again, but yeah, that’s essentially what happened.”

A second timeline. A second version of herself living out her life with no knowledge of this one. Unless it had all been erased when the timeline had changed like the Master’s reign of terror.

Somehow, meeting Rose Tyler was no longer the strangest part of her day.

“Are we at least on the better timeline?” Martha asked, not really expecting an answer.

“We are. We’ll make sure of it,” Rose said, and her certainty stunned Martha. “The Doctor didn’t have warning last time, and we didn’t have these two weeks to prepare.”

Martha nodded. “And you’re notifying UNIT and Torchwood. Why? If this bomb affects all of reality, why are you focusing on Earth?”

“At the moment of the reality bomb, the timelines converge on Earth,” Rose said. “Whatever it is, it starts here.”

“Great,” Martha said. “It always has to be here, doesn’t it?”

The wry smile returned, and Rose said, “Seems that way, sometimes.”

Too much of the time in Martha’s opinion. It’d be nice if just once the threat could be to a different planet far on the other side of the universe.

“So what can UNIT do to help?”

“Jack and the Doctor are working on the timeline convergence. Gwen and Ianto are searching for any sign of an invasion that's already started like suspicious structures being built. But Jack’s Torchwood doesn’t keep an eye on the stars. They don’t have the data to tell if any have disappeared in this universe.”

“UNIT does,” Martha said. “We have a whole astronomy department and are in contact with all the major observatories throughout the world.”

Rose sighed in relief. “Good. We were hoping for that.”

Martha stood up. “I’ll call them right now and see what they know.”

“While you do that,” Rose said, “does UNIT also have one of those databases that can look up information on anyone in the world?”

Her hand on the phone, Martha paused and looked back towards Rose. “Why do you ask?”

“There’s a few people I’d like to look up, but I can’t do it in front of the Doctor.”

Martha weighed her options. Rose might be travelling with the Doctor, but she wasn’t an employee of UNIT. She shouldn’t have access to their databases. UNIT didn’t play fast and loose with the rules like Torchwood did. On the other hand, Martha was intensely curious about what types of secrets Rose Tyler kept from the Doctor.

“How many people?”

“Just three,” Rose said, “and they may not even exist yet. That’s why I’m checking.”

“Okay -- but just those three.”

Martha logged into the computer by Rose, and then moved back to the phone to call astronomy.

“Hi Joy. It’s Martha Jones. The Doctor has contacted me with some questions about our readings.”

While Martha explained to UNIT’s astrophysicist what information they were looking for, she kept an eye on Rose searching the database. Rose’s demeanor changed instantly after her first search. She sat up straighter, her face brightened, and a smile crept out. By her third search, she was full on grinning.

“Great. Thank you, Joy.”

Martha hung up the phone, and Rose immediately turned to her.

“You’ve gotta come see this.”

“What am I seeing?” Martha pulled her chair over to Rose.

Rose pointed at the screen. “They do exist in our time. Look! Graham O’Brien, bus driver in Sheffield, exactly the same -- although you haven’t gone grey yet, have you, Graham?”

Martha noted that Rose stuck her tongue between her teeth when she grinned. The Doctor probably loved that. She quickly redirected her thoughts to the screen and took in the employee ID image of a middle-aged white man with brown hair.

“Who’s Graham O’Brien?”

“Future friend of the Doctor,” Rose said. “It’s weird, though. He’s not married and there’s no next of kin listed.”

“Why’s that weird?”

Rose shrugged. “Ryan called him ‘grandad’ but I suppose it could’ve been a term of endearment. Speaking of.”

She clicked over to another name, Ryan Sinclair, and it brought up a school portrait of a very young, seemingly very shy black boy. Only the corner of his mouth quirked up, like the photographer had tried to coax a smile but had only managed to make the boy less certain.

“Don’t tell me he travels with the Doctor, too.”

“He does.”

“He’s nine!”

“Yeah, but give it ten or so years,” Rose said. “I can’t believe they exist in our day. They could’ve been from anywhere, but they’re here.”

Well, they were in Sheffield, not Cardiff, but Martha assumed Rose meant here as in 2008.

“Looks like he lives with his grandmother.”

“Oh, so he does. I wonder if that means there’s a wedding in their future.”

Rose shot Martha an excited grin like Martha would also find news of a potential wedding between Graham and Ryan’s grandmother exciting. She didn’t, especially when Rose added:

“I wonder why his grandmother’s not travelling with them if Graham is.”

A pit formed in Martha’s stomach. She had her guesses, but she didn’t know anything for certain and tried to reassure herself with that. Even if Ryan’s grandmother was dead by the time Ryan travelled with the Doctor, it didn’t mean it was the Doctor’s fault. People died for lots of ordinary, human reasons every day.

“But here’s the best one,” Rose said and clicked over to the final name. Yasmin Khan brought up another school portrait, this one of a little girl with brown skin and straight black hair braided down the back. She smiled widely for the camera, either more confident or more eager to please than Ryan Sinclair had been. She was also nine years old and attended the same primary school as Ryan.

“Look at her! She’s even still missing a tooth. It’s adorable.”

Rose grinned happily at the image, but Martha found it haunting. From her viewpoint, Yasmin’s school picture looked like the pictures of missing children that got plastered all over the news stations and billboards: those carefully selected images of the child happy and innocent and utterly unaware of what horrors awaited them. Martha’s eyes dropped down to the family section and read that Yasmin had a mother, a father, and a younger sister.

Did her family know where she disappeared to? When Yasmin called home, did she tell her mother where she was and who she was with or did she lie like Martha had? Did Yasmin’s family get hurt because she made the decision to follow a mysterious man into a blue box?

“It’s wild,” Rose said. “I’ve wondered about who might have come before, but I’ve never thought about who might come after us, or imagined that there could be people out there right now, living their lives, completely unaware that they’ll meet the Doctor one day.”

“Yeah,” Martha said, still trying to shake off the feeling of seeing a ghost. “I’ve never thought about that either, even after meeting Donna.”

“It’s a bit mind-boggling.” Rose stared at the image on screen again. Quietly, she said, “Someday Yaz, you’re going to grow up to see the stars.”

Unless she saw something worse.

Martha finally cleared her thoughts and changed the subject. “Speaking of stars, our astronomy department hasn’t noticed any abnormalities yet, but they’re going to comb through the last few months of data to confirm.”

“That’s great. Thank you.”

Martha nodded. “Anything else UNIT can do?”

Rose frowned. “What about this spaceship you found? You sure it couldn’t have anything to do with an invasion or a pending reality bomb?”

“I don’t see how,” Martha said. “The ship was completely unarmed. We’re not even sure it had defensive shielding. It just seems like a transport vessel from another world that got lost. Our theory is it slipped through the rift.”

“I don’t know,” Rose said. “I’ve seen Slitheen use a spaceship to set the world on red alert so they could get their hands on nuclear missiles.”

“When was this?”

“Do you remember a spaceship crashing into Big Ben a few years back?”

“Yeah, I do,” Martha said and then she realized the implications. “Of course, the Doctor was involved with that.”

Rose smiled, but also winced as she said, “We were also responsible for blowing up Downing Street.”

Martha nodded. “I don’t know why I hadn’t put that together yet.”

Rose chuckled.

“But the world isn’t on red alert for this crash,” Martha said. “No one even noticed it except for UNIT and a handful of locals -- well, and Torchwood, but we beat them there. Jack was not pleased.”

“Still, it might be worth taking a look. Could you take me to the crash site?”

“No.” Martha wasn’t going to bend the rules that much. “Our officers are still mapping it, but I can show you our pictures of the site.”

“That’ll work.”

Martha took control of the computer and pulled up the project file for the crash site. Chemical and radiation analyses, formal write-ups, and the autopsies she’d completed were all still pending, but they had a file of images taken immediately after UNIT arrived on site. The spaceship had scraped a church tower during its descent -- causing more damage to itself than the church which was one reason why UNIT didn’t believe it had shields equipped. When it had finally hit the ground, it had shattered and sent debris flying up to five hundred meters away. UNIT had carefully cataloged every piece before removing anything. Martha slowly clicked through these photos and talked Rose through what she knew about the crash.

“Wait, go back one,” Rose said. Martha did, and Rose pointed at some of the debris. “Do you know what that is?”

It was hard to see in the picture, but Martha had seen the items as they were brought in. “They’re items the ship was carrying, seems to have come from packages or maybe luggage. We’re not sure which.”

“It looks like a children’s doll.”

“It looked that way to us too,” Martha said. “And two of the bodies we found were much smaller than the others. The bones showed growth plates that hadn’t closed yet. Fairly, certain they were children.”

“Two children?”

“Not likely to be part of an alien invasion with children on board.”

But Rose didn’t seem to be thinking that far ahead. “Four bodies, two of them children, that’s what you found?”

Martha noticed Rose’s face had paled. Of course, Rose wasn’t medically trained and wouldn’t have developed the same armor Martha used to get through autopsies, but still Martha hadn’t expected this reaction from Rose. A person had to have a tough exterior and the ability to keep a cool head in any situation to travel with the Doctor. The Doctor didn’t settle for anything less. It slowed him down.

Slowly, Martha said, “I haven’t encountered this species before, so I could be wrong. But yes, it seemed like two adults and two children.”

“It can’t be,” Rose murmured. Before Martha could ask about it, Rose leaned forward in her chair. “Was there any part of the spaceship left intact, anything to identify it?”

“There were some larger pieces, but nothing really helpful to identifying it.”

“What about a design painted on the door?” Rose asked. “A blue design, it would’ve looked almost like a flower with a large circle around it -- a sun, except the rays were radiating squiggles curving around parallel with the circle instead of sticking straight out from it like we draw.”

Martha stared. “That’s oddly specific. Have you seen this ship before?”

Rose shook her head. “Not here I haven’t.”

“Okay. Well, we didn’t find a design like that, but those squiggles sound familiar.”

Martha searched the photos until she found it. This chunk of debris was small with no signs it had ever belonged to a door, but it showed some curved blue lines painted onto it. It was nowhere close to the full design Rose had described. Still, it was enough for Rose’s face to fall and her shoulders to slump back.

“Oh god, it is them.”

The armor Martha always relied on evaporated with that quiet statement. Her stomach twisted around itself.

“You knew them?”

Rose shook her head. “It was on the other side… in the parallel world…. There was this ship we picked up on radar one day. Small. Alone. They were broadcasting a message, but we couldn’t understand it, and then suddenly the message was broadcast in Chinese. It was probably the most politely worded alien message I’ve ever heard. Something like ‘pardon us while we update our translators to be compatible with your world’. It turned out their ship was scanning our media broadcasts and learning each of our languages within minutes. It was so clever.”

She smiled as she recounted that part. Martha’s stomach continued to twist in dread.

“Who were they?”

“No one. Just an ordinary family on holiday,” Rose said. “Their translator eventually picked up English and we could talk to them more easily. You know how people here will pack up their family in an RV for a year long, cross-continental trip?”

Martha nodded.

“That’s basically what they were doing, just on an intergalactic scale,” Rose said. “But I guess they didn’t read the guidebook as thoroughly as they should have. They knew Earth wasn’t advanced enough to have interplanetary travel yet, but they didn’t realize we _were_ advanced enough to notice an alien spaceship landing. The parents felt so bad about the mix-up. They begged us not to report them to the Shadow Proclamation.” She shook her head. “Like we were capable of it. Mickey and I were the only ones who had even heard of the Shadow Proclamation.”

“They’re just tourists?”

“Yeah.” Rose smiled again. “I got to play tour guide for a week. Showed them all around London -- they got a kick out of hearing I was from a parallel world. They asked me to explain all the differences between our Londons and had the kids write them down in their notebooks.” She stared at the image of what used to be a door. “Best week I spent over there.”

These weren’t alien corpses and a mysterious spaceship crash. These were Rose’s friends; the crash was a tragedy. Maybe she hadn’t known them in this universe, but still.

“I’m sorry,” Martha said.

Rose nodded. Her eyes shone under the office’s fluorescent lights, but no tears fell. She flicked her attention back to Martha and asked, “Ships use stars for navigation. Could they have been thrown off track by a star disappearing?”

The worst part of medical school had been when they had to break the news that someone’s loved one had passed away. As a student, Martha had only witnessed it while the attending doctor led the conversation. Then, instead of a residency after she’d graduated, she’d been rushed into UNIT where her job was to patch people up and autopsy unexplained deaths. It was the commanding officer’s job to tell the families when someone died on duty, and Martha had no direct reports. As such, she’d never quite developed a bedside manner and wasn’t sure how to tell Rose what she knew.

“It wasn’t a navigation error,” Martha started. “When I….”

 _Cut into your friend_ , but Martha couldn’t say that. She took a deep breath and tried again.

“When I examined the pilot, I found hardening of the arteries and stress on the heart.”

“A heart attack,” Rose said.

Martha nodded. “I mean, they’re not human, but if they were, that’d be my conclusion. A heart attack caused the crash.”

Rose breathed in. “God, they really are an ordinary family in an RV.”

“It doesn't seem like they have anything to do with a coming reality bomb. The crash is just a really shitty coincidence.”

“It’s not entirely a coincidence,” Rose said.

Martha watched as Rose packed away her grief and replaced it with a hardened focus: exactly as the Doctor had taught them both. Grieve later. Focus on the problem now.

Rose pulled out her phone and began texting someone. “They visited almost a year ago. It wasn’t long after that when we started noticing stars going out. That gives us a starting point for the date of the reality bomb.”

This time, Martha couldn’t pack away her own feelings as easily. She’d managed not to flinch when the field officers had unloaded the bodies yesterday. She’d known two of them were too small. She’d known they had to be children even before she’d examined the bone growth. That’s why she’d put them off until this morning. She’d told herself examining the adults first would give her better insight into the species make-up. She’d told herself they were victims of the rift, like so many other victims Torchwood and occasionally UNIT had to deal with. She’d told herself this because nothing could be done if it wasn’t true. The only future for those bodies was to sit in a UNIT freezer until eventually, in a decade or so, being incinerated to make room for new victims. They were part of an investigation, pieces of a puzzle. Analyzing them further wouldn’t have done her any good.

“Did you know their names?”

Rose looked up from her phone. Then, she shook her head. “English didn’t have the right sounds to pronounce them. I’m not sure any human language did. But they taught me how to write their family name in their script. Do you have any paper?”

Martha fetched a sheet from the printer. She suspected lined paper would just get in the way, and she was right. What Rose drew -- and it was certainly closer to drawing than writing -- was far too complicated to fit on lined paper. The design was as layered as the Doctor’s complicated script. But instead of elegant concentric circles, there was a base of offset triangles. Then over it, Rose added more and more lines and squiggles. The pattern looked random, but it couldn’t have been if it was someone’s written language.

“You remember how to draw all that from a year ago?”

Rose gave a half-smile. “I drew it a lot after they left. Kept copying it until I had it memorized. I couldn’t read it, but it was nice seeing an alien language again. We didn’t get many alien visitors on that Earth.”

“There also isn’t the Doctor on that Earth.”

Rose’s smile grew. “He does attract trouble.”

She finished the final line and handed the paper to Martha. Obviously, Martha couldn’t read the alien name either, but it looked pretty. And at least she now had something better to list on their identifying tags besides 200806A, B, C, and D.

“Actually,” Rose said, her smile now faded, “that brings up another point. When we were talking with Jack about who might be behind this reality bomb, he pointed out it could be a targeted attack.”

Martha froze. “Targeted at the Doctor?”

“Yeah.”

Martha’s chest tightened with icy fury. That meant someone would be using Earth as both bait and collateral damage in their vendetta against the Doctor -- _again_. Of course, that’s what this was. _Of course._

“And if they’re targeting the Doctor," Martha said, "they'll be targeting anyone associated with him.”

“Probably,” Rose said.

At least, Rose had the awareness to sound apologetic. It was better than the Doctor had done at the end.

Rose continued, “My family’s safe in a parallel world. As long as we can stop the reality bomb, they’ll be fine. But your family and Donna’s….”

Martha’s hands balled into fists. “What can we do?” she asked, hoping to god Rose was as good as the Doctor had always claimed she was.

“Jack’s offered up Torchwood,” Rose said. “And I’m sure it’s protected, but it’s not exactly civilian friendly. I don’t know how much your family knows about aliens and things.”

“More than I’d like them to.” Then, Martha remembered, “Except for Tom, my fiance. He doesn’t know any of it yet. He doesn’t even know what UNIT is beyond military.”

“So sending him to a base centered on a rift in time and space where a pterodactyl freely flies through the rafters is probably not the best idea.”

“Probably not,” Martha agreed. “And if Earth is being targeted, they’ll want to take out our defenses. That means Torchwood and UNIT will be targeted as well.”

“Does UNIT have any safe houses?”

Martha shook her head. “We just have our bases, but they’re not defended any better than any other military base in the world. We have alien weaponry, but no alien defenses.”

“And Sarah Jane has a kid now, so we can’t send anyone to her.” Rose trailed off with a frown.

Martha wouldn’t put her family through anymore torment. She couldn’t. “What about your parallel world? If the walls have broken down, does that mean the Doctor can travel there right now?”

“He’s worried about how quickly the walls will close once we stop the bomb. He doesn’t want to risk anyone getting trapped.”

“But you’re risking your family getting trapped over there.”

“It’s not a risk. They live there,” Rose said with a sharpness in her voice that made Martha’s blood boil.

Martha glared. “Listen, unless you have a better idea of how to protect my family, I want them sent to your parallel world. You already said it’s safe from everything but the reality bomb.”

“I might actually.”

“Might what?” Martha snapped.

“Have a better idea,” Rose said. “Can I look up one more name on your database?”

“Who?”

“Someone who travelled with the Doctor like us,” Rose said. “It’s a long shot. I got her name in the future, so she may not have even travelled with him yet. But if she has, she might help us.”

“Do it. We’re talking about my family,” Martha said. “Any long shot you’ve got, we’re taking it.

Rose turned back to the computer and re-opened the search database. She entered the name Dorothy McShane. Martha frowned. Why did that sound familiar?

The woman’s picture didn’t illuminate anything when it popped up. Dorothy was a white woman with straight brown hair. Born 1970, age thirty-seven, nearly thirty-eight. Lived in London. Martha had never seen her before in her life.

“I can’t believe it,” Rose breathed out. “She said old friend but that was two thousand years in the future. It could’ve meant anything.”

“She hasn’t worked for UNIT, has she?”

“No, she founded a charity called A Charitable Earth. It was started to help underprivileged children, but she’s been branching out lately. It says here, she sent assistance last month to the Philippines after a tropical storm.”

“A Charitable Earth?” Martha repeated. “Why does that sound familiar too?”

“Maybe you’ve seen donation bins for it?” Rose said. “Here’s the logo.”

Rose enlarged the image. The logo was a greyscale Earth overlaid by a rather large and collegiate looking “A”. Martha recognized it instantly.

“Oh, it does have to do with UNIT!” she said. “A Charitable Earth is who’s trying to buy some property near our London headquarters. The director’s furious about it.”

“Does UNIT know who Dorothy is and that she’s travelled with the Doctor?” Rose asked.

Martha thought back to the files she’d read when she’d first started with UNIT. The Doctor had destroyed his own records ages ago, but UNIT still had records of several of his travel companions. Dorothy hadn’t been among them.

“I don’t think so,” she said. “No one’s talked about her like she’s connected to the Doctor. They’re just worried about the headquarters being compromised if too many new businesses -- or charities, in this case -- move into the area. We’d buy the land ourselves, but we don’t have the funding.”

“Dorothy does,” Rose said, staring at something on the screen.

“Did you click on her bank accounts?” Martha hissed. “You didn’t need that information.”

Rose nodded towards the screen. “Have you seen these numbers? My father’s a millionaire in that parallel world, and I haven’t seen a bank account balance like that.”

Curiosity got the better of Martha, and she leaned forward to read the bank information. “Good god.”

“Right?”

“How did she get that much money?”

“I’m guessing time travel.”

Martha side-eyed Rose. “The Doctor wouldn’t have allowed that.”

“No,” Rose agreed. “But they didn’t exactly part on the best of terms.”

Martha’s stomach sunk. “How bad was it? Is she not going to help us?”

“If she _can_ help us, then she’s going to help us,” Rose said. “We just may have to be extra convincing.”

Martha cocked her eyebrow. “For a year, I had to travel the Earth lying to everyone about a gun in four parts that could kill a Time Lord permanently. Trust me, I can be convincing.”

Rose looked sufficiently stunned. “Right.”

“Let’s go.”

Martha marched towards the door. Behind her, Rose stammered, “Okay, but are we taking Torchwood’s car or-?”

Martha rolled her eyes and pulled her car keys from her pocket. “I have my own car. I’ll drive us.”

“Oh, thank you.”

“Can you seriously not drive?”

“I can,” Rose said, “but I grew up in London where my father was definitely not a millionaire. I took the bus everywhere.”

“What is your father in this world, then?”

“Dead.”

Martha blinked. “Right.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Martha’s anxiety spikes near the end of this chapter when Ace (Dorothy) mentions the Master. Not a panic attack, but she definitely reacts. Skim or skip what you need to.
> 
> Ace uses her given name Dorothy McShane as an adult, so that's what I used here.
> 
> Also I said it in “change the currents of our lives” and I’ll say it again: At Childhood’s End by Sophie Aldred is a gift and I cannot recommend that tie-in novel enough.

Martha understood why Dorothy McShane was looking for a new location. A Charitable Earth had clearly outgrown the single floor of an office building it rented. The front desk sat only ten feet away from the rows of cubicles. A handful of enclosed offices lined one wall while the other was divided into restrooms and a conference room. Filing cabinets and donations boxes were stacked against any bit of wall space available.

“Oh, I see it now,” Rose said. She was examining the large sign by the entrance with the charity’s logo and the words “A Charitable Earth” stacked vertically beside it. With a glance to Martha, Rose pointed to the sign. “It spells Ace.”

The words were left aligned on the sign, so the acronym ACE was easily spotted, but it seemed like a coincidence to Martha.

“Does that mean something?”

Rose said, “It’s the name she used when she travelled with the Doctor.”

Ah, Dorothy McShane was a new name. Maybe that’s why UNIT didn’t know about her.

“But we’re not bringing him into this, yeah?”

Rose shook her head. “No, stick with the UNIT story. It seems like our best bet if she wants that land so badly.”

“She’s probably wanted it from the beginning,” Martha said, scanning the floor again. “Just waited until she had an excuse for it.”

“An excuse like an overcrowded office floor?” Rose said.

“Exactly what I was thinking.”

They exchanged smiles. 

The receptionist finally returned to the front desk. Noticing them standing by the entrance, the young man asked, “I’m sorry, can I help you?”

Martha took the lead and crossed over to the desk. “Hello. I’m Dr. Martha Jones.” She held up her ID badge. “I’m here on behalf of UNIT and would like to speak to Dorothy McShane.”

“Sure, of course,” the receptionist said. “Who’s UNIT?”

Rose had to turn away to hide her knowing smirk. Martha managed to keep her face neutral at this ignorance, but her internal alerts were pinging like mad.

“Dorothy will know it,” she answered.

“Right,” the man said slowly. He looked to Rose. “And your name is?”

“Rose Tyler.” She held up a suspiciously blank paper in a billfold. “Also with UNIT.”

The man still seemed uncertain about them, but the blank paper didn’t increase his suspicions. “Just one moment, please. I’ll see if she’s available.”

He walked off to one of the enclosed offices. Martha eyed Rose’s billfold as she slid it back into her pocket.

“That doesn’t look like the Doctor’s psychic paper.”

“It’s not. It’s my own.”

Bitterness stabbed Martha’s chest. “You have your own?”

“Yep. I’m not saying my Torchwood is more clever than Jack’s, but we are a bit more organized. It lets us create handy tools like psychic paper.”

Oh, it had come from her parallel world, not the Doctor. Jealousy averted, then.

“Please complain to Jack about his lack of organization,” Martha said. “I’ve been telling him he needs to introduce more rules around the place, but he won’t listen to me.”

Rose grinned. “That’s Jack, isn’t? Rules are just a list of things he shouldn’t do.”

“One day, he’ll learn it’s the opposite,” Martha grumbled as the receptionist returned to the front desk.

“I’m sorry,” the man said. “She didn’t recognize the name UNIT, and her schedule’s all booked up for today. Would you like to make an appointment and come back another time?”

Martha cocked her jaw with irritated disbelief. A glance to Rose showed that her eyes had narrowed like this was an unexpected puzzle and not a massive obstacle.

With a calming breath, Martha pushed, “Tell her it’s about the property she’s trying to buy near the Tower of London. UNIT’s willing to drop the legal battles and negotiate.”

“I can do that, but it would help if you could tell me what UNIT is. Are they another charity?”

“It’s classified,” Martha said.

“Right.” The man either didn’t believe them or thought their odds of getting an appointment with Dorothy were next to zero. “I’ll be back.”

Martha drummed her fingers on the desk. “They parted on such bad terms, she doesn’t even want to talk to UNIT.”

“It might not be UNIT,” Rose said. “It could be us. She might have recognized our names if she’s kept close tabs on him.”

“But that’ll mean she won’t talk to us at all.”

“Just give it a minute.”

If they couldn’t get Dorothy’s help, Martha would definitely be sending her family to Rose’s parallel world. She didn’t care what arguments the Doctor had against it. She would not leave her family in the line of fire again.

Rose suddenly straightened. “I think we got her attention now.”

Dorothy McShane had finally left her office. Martha’s hope rose. Dorothy stopped just behind the front desk and placed her hands on her hips.

“You have five minutes to explain yourselves before I kick you out.”

Rose glanced around. “Are we talking out here?”

“Nope.” Then, Dorothy held up her wrist and started an honest-to-god timer on her watch. “Follow me.”

Hopes dashed again, Martha muttered to Rose, “She is not a friendly ally.”

“Just stick with the plan. It’s all we have,” Rose muttered back.

Dorothy led them over to the conference room, not her personal office, which prompted Martha to wonder what Dorothy had in there that she didn’t want them to see. Pictures of the Doctor? A secret lab? Surveillance equipment?

Dorothy shut the door after they entered, and then sat down at the table. Martha and Rose took seats on the opposite side.

“You have four minutes and twenty-six seconds now."

Martha refused to be intimidated by another human. "There's a crisis approaching, and UNIT is asking for your help. In exchange, we'll back off and let you buy that property the city's been fighting you on."

"Sure," Dorothy said with a shrug. "Help during a crisis is what we do. However, UNIT is not listed on the property records nor have they been mentioned in any meetings with the city. So your quid pro quo offer seems a bit empty." 

"You're a charity," Rose said. "Help us out of the goodness of your heart." 

"But who would I be helping, Ms. Tyler? Who is this UNIT?" 

Martha rolled her eyes. "Oh I don't know, maybe the people you're trying to spy on by buying the land next door." 

"Spying? First, you ask for my help, and now you accuse me of spying,” Dorothy said. “Why would I want to spy on an organization I've never heard of?" 

"Because you have heard of us!" 

"Look," Rose cut in. "This crisis is serious. It doesn't just affect this world, it threatens all of reality. My source says you have experience with these kinds of problems, and that you’re more than capable of handling them. In fact, they called you brilliant." 

Martha could tell Dorothy didn't believe them by the way she glanced back and forth between them like she was trying to gauge their sanity -- or at least she was pretending to not believe them. Rose had said Dorothy would likely be resistant if they brought up the Doctor, but they hadn't come up with an alternative plan if she also denied knowing about UNIT and extraterrestrial threats to Earth.

Well, Rose hadn't bothered with an alternative plan. Martha still had hers. 

Dorothy finally replied, "Look, I appreciate the flattery, but you two do know what a charity is, right? We don't spy on people, and our problems are grounded in reality, not threatening it." 

"We know," Rose said. "That's why we were hoping for specifically your help, not A Charitable Earth's."

"Ah, finally we're a step closer to the truth," Dorothy said. "Go on then, what kind of help do you think I could give you?" 

"Evacuating our families," Martha said. 

Dorothy raised her eyebrow. "Evacuating your families out of the path of something that allegedly threatens all of reality? Do you also think I’m a superhero? Where would I even place your families to protect them from reality ending?" 

"We're tackling the threat to reality," Martha said. "You'd be getting our families out of the way of whoever's behind the threat." 

Dorothy leaned back in her chair and considered this. "So to clarify, some supervillain is heading here to threaten reality -- which I assume means the existence of everything -- and you want my help to evacuate your families out of the path of this supervillain even though the destruction of reality suggests there wouldn't be any place to hide from said supervillain."

"We'd stop reality from being destroyed, clearly," Rose said. "You'd just have to keep them safe in the meantime."

"Because I'm a brilliant, magical being with super powers in your eyes." 

Rose shrugged. "I learned my best friend was immortal today, so who knows?"

Martha ignored this and added, "It doesn't take super powers to hide well. Just cleverness." 

A long moment passed where Dorothy just stared at Martha, sizing her up. Then, she sized up Rose for almost as long. When she finally spoke, it was to say a single word. 

"No." 

"Why not?" Martha demanded.

“Because you haven’t convinced me you’re from a real organization or that you have a real crisis.” Dorothy checked her watch. “And you're down to a minute to even try. So I think this is where I wish you a good day and ask you to leave.”

“No, just wait,” Rose tried as Dorothy stood up.

“Forget it,” Martha snapped. “We’re going with our first plan.”

“We don’t have another plan,” Rose said.

“I do. I’m sending them to your parallel world. End of story.”

“No! They could get trapped there. You wouldn’t see them again.”

“That’s clearly not a concern for you,” Martha said.

Rose glared. “That’s different.”

“Is it?” Martha said. “What’d you do, then: give up your entire family to come back? Is he really worth that to you?”

“Stop it,” Rose said.

“Because he’s not to me.” Martha’s heart pounded. “I’m keeping my family safe, and if that means I have to go into that parallel world with them, then I will.”

“You don’t even know what’s on the other side. There could already be a Martha Jones over there.”

“Then, I’ll change my name and move to Australia. I don’t care!”

“Enough!” Dorothy shouted above them.

Rose fell silent. Martha’s arms shook with rage.

“You were the one who found this woman,” Martha shot over to Rose before leaning back in her chair and crossing her arms. “She probably doesn’t even have a safe house.”

“Funnily enough, I do.” Dorothy sat back down in her chair and leaned her arms on the table. “Alright, I think it’s time to drop the pretenses. I might know who UNIT is, but you two aren’t with them.”

Martha argued, “I work with UNIT as a medical officer.”

“But that’s not who sent you here today,” Dorothy said.

“No one sent us,” Rose said. “We came here on our own.”

“See, I just said to drop the pretenses.” Dorothy eyed up Rose again. “Rose Tyler. You died at Canary Wharf nearly two years ago -- or at least that’s what the records say.”

“Records can be wrong.”

“Escaped to a parallel world, instead, did you?” Dorothy asked.

Rose’s eyes narrowed. “Trapped.”

Dorothy nodded slowly and turned her attention to Martha. “And you, Martha Jones…. Last year, your family was taken in for questioning by the short-lived Saxon administration and then released a day later with no explanation.”

“I’m not talking about that,” Martha said coldly.

“Except another strange thing happened that day,” Dorothy continued. “My watch inexplicably jumped forward twenty seconds.”

Martha held Dorothy's gaze even as her stomach churned.

Dorothy asked, “How much time actually passed before your family was released?”

Martha dug her fingernails into her palms. Through gritted teeth, she answered, “A year.”

Dorothy didn’t show surprise. Instead, her expression turned questioning. “Who was Harold Saxon, really? Was he even human?"

Martha shook her head. “He’s dead, so it doesn’t matter.” 

Dorothy finally shifted her searching gaze away, and Martha forced herself to breathe again.

“I know you’re not here because of UNIT -- though I do appreciate the confirmation that they don’t want me moving in next door.” Dorothy tilted her head up. “That’s rather satisfying. But whatever help the Professor is wanting from me, I’m not offering. I have no desire to get involved in his mind games again.”

“Wait,” Rose said, “you called him the Professor?”

“Why, what do you call him?”

“The Doctor.”

Dorothy waved her hand in dismissal. “That’s how he introduced himself, but I always thought he looked more like the professor type.”

Martha didn’t give a damn what Dorothy had called the Doctor. “He’s not the one asking for your help. We are. Like Rose said, he doesn’t even know we’re here.”

"What's coming that affects all of reality?" Dorothy asked. 

"We don't know yet. Just that it was referred to as a bomb and it happens in two weeks," Rose said. 

"But there's something or someone else coming with this bomb that'll threaten your families?" 

"It's just a guess," Rose said. "We're trying to prepare for anything." 

"It's not much of a guess. People have been targeted before because they were associated with the Doctor," Martha said. 

"Ah, so that's what happened last year." 

Martha didn't like the knowing look in Dorothy's eye. She was used to no one remembering what had happened when the Master ruled the Earth. It was unnerving seeing Dorothy put even just a few of the pieces together.

"Can you help my family or not?" 

Dorothy sized her up again, and then said, "I can but on three conditions. One, you don't tell the Professor about me."

"That's better for us, too," Rose agreed. 

"Two, you keep me informed about what is coming and when."

"Obviously," Martha said. 

"I mean all of it, every single thing you learn between now and the crisis," Dorothy said. "And three, UNIT steps aside and lets me buy that property for my new headquarters." 

Martha had been the one to offer that so she didn't have much choice than to agree. "I assume you want me to convince them without revealing that you've traveled with the Doctor?" 

"UNIT doesn't remember I ran with the Professor?"

Martha froze. Had she just revealed too much? 

Dorothy broke into a wide grin. "Wicked. And yes, see if you can keep it that way. It'll be easier to see what they're up to if they don't know who I am."

“Okay, you can’t admit to spying on my employers and then still expect me to help you.”

“It’s not spying,” Dorothy countered. “Think of it like watching the news. I’m just trying to stay informed. It’s the same reason you joined UNIT, isn’t it?”

Martha’s mind reached for her actual reasons for joining UNIT -- and came up blank. UNIT helped people. But did they? They could help protect the Earth during those rare (but obviously not rare enough) alien invasions, but what did they accomplish in between? Scavenging tech, running experiments, and dissecting alien bodies like lab rats. More and more, it seemed like there wasn’t any difference between UNIT and Torchwood besides regulations and the sizes of their workforce.

“I suppose,” Martha said, since she couldn’t find an argument against it.

Dorothy picked up a memo pad and a pen from the stack in the center of the table. “How many would I need to evacuate?”

Rose answered, “Our friend Donna Noble has her mother and grandfather.”

Dorothy frowned as she made note of that. “I don’t think I know about Donna Noble yet. And what about you?”

Rose shook her head. “My family lives in that parallel world. They’re safe.”

Turning her gaze, Dorothy asked, “How many do you have, Martha?”

“How many can you take?”

Dorothy’s expression softened. “I’m not going to make you pick and choose from your own family. I have the room. How many do you need to hide?”

“Seven,” Martha said. “If I can convince my fiance that hiding is necessary.”

While she wrote on her notepad, Dorothy said, “I have kidnapping services for hire as well.” But she shot Martha a smile after that suggested it had been a joke. Martha couldn’t manage to smile back.

“How safe is this safe house?” Martha asked. “Are we just relying on whoever’s coming not knowing where to find you, or do you have defenses set up?”

“Alien defenses you mean? I have some.” Dorothy got that same grin she’d worn when she’d said ‘wicked’. “And I have some homegrown ones as well. Trust me, if anyone tries to bust in, they’re committing themselves to a very short, very painful life.”

“Anyone?” Martha pressed. “Because this could be someone like the Sontarans again or Daleks or Weeping Angels -- well, probably not Weeping Angels.”

Rose interrupted, “Wait, you’ve seen Daleks? When?”

“New York, 1930.”

Rose turned forward in her seat and said to herself. “God, they won’t stay dead, will they? No matter what happens, they always find a way to come back.”

It was remarkably similar to what the Doctor had said when he’d seen the Daleks.

“Well, I’ve seen Daleks, too,” Dorothy said. “And Cybermen and some truly terrifying robot clowns -- and between my incredibly advanced trip wires and some stolen cloaking technology, none of them stand a chance of breaking in. Even someone like the Master wouldn’t be able to circumvent my defenses.”

Martha’s heart stopped.

Dorothy couldn’t have just said the Master. Martha must have misheard her. She must have said something else -- except Rose followed up with the question:

“Who’s the Master?”

Dorothy answered, “He’s a Time Lord like the Professor.”

_Oh god, oh god, oh god._

While Martha struggled to breathe, Rose leaned forward in her seat.

“You’ve met other Time Lords?”

“A few of them,” Dorothy said. “They’re all awful, pompous people, though - except the Master. He’s just pure evil.”

This wasn’t as bad as those times Martha would wake up from a nightmare. She could still think clearly. Hearing the name out loud had just been a shock. She hadn’t in a million years expected to hear that name spoken again. Even her family didn’t use it.

“I take it you haven’t met anyone else?” Dorothy continued. “I know humans aren’t allowed on Gallifrey, but the Council liked to berate the Professor often enough in my day.”

"There isn't anyone else," Rose said.

"What do you mean?" 

"There was a war between the Time Lords and the Daleks," Rose said. "The Doctor's the only survivor." 

Dorothy frowned. "You mean they're all dead? Every Time Lord?" 

Rose nodded. "Even their planet was destroyed."

Except the Master had survived by hiding at the end of the universe. On Martha's darkest nights, she feared others had survived too. Not people like the Doctor, but Time Lords who were like the Master, or even worse. Hearing that the Doctor had been at odds with some council on Gallifrey would only fuel those fears now. Who else might have a vendetta against the Doctor?

"That war is over," Martha said, finally finding her voice. "We're about to face our own now. Are we all settled here? Do we have a deal?" 

"Yes, I think so." Dorothy was clearly still thinking through these Time War revelations even as she accepted the subject change. She pulled a business card from her pocket and slid it across the table to Martha. "Send me the names and addresses and I'll take care of the rest." 

"Good." Martha stood up. "Then, I need to get back to Cardiff. I still have work to finish up." 

Rose stood up too, though it was clearly sooner than she'd wanted to leave. Martha didn't care. What was Rose going to do? Martha was the one with the car keys. 

"I'm really glad to have met you," Rose said to Dorothy. 

"Yeah," Dorothy said. "It was actually nice meeting both of you too. Don't forget to keep me posted on this reality bomb." 

"We won't. And thanks for your help." 

Rose was closest to the door. Martha followed behind her, but at the threshold, she hesitated. 

"Just a second," she said and closed the door before Rose could respond. She turned around. Dorothy was now standing too, and it brought them to eye level. 

Martha took a steeling breath. "He was the Master." 

"Harold Saxon was?" 

Martha nodded. "But he's dead now. This reality bomb won't be from him." 

"Are you sure?" Dorothy asked. "The Professor used to say Time Lords couldn't die. That they had this thing called regeneration." 

"He chose not to in order to spite the Doctor," Martha answered. "Trust me, he's dead." 

Dorothy nodded. Martha gave herself another second to calm her adrenaline spike, and then reached for the door handle. Dorothy stopped her. 

"That reality bomb will be up to you lot. I won't be able to protect your family from that," Dorothy said. "But anything else, I promise, I will keep them safe."

Her eyes were sincere. And if she had seen all that she'd claimed to, then she knew how to prepare for what was coming. Yes, Martha believed Dorothy could, indeed, keep her family safe. 

"Thank you." 

Martha opened the door and stepped outside to a confused Rose. Then, one last thought hit her, and she turned back around.

"Oh, and be sure to keep yourself safe, too, while you're at it." 

Dorothy grinned again, that slow growing almost feral grin that Martha suddenly realized was exactly like the Doctor's.

"I once took out a Dalek with a baseball bat," she said. "Don't worry. I can take care of myself." She pushed past them through the doorway and with a wave of her hand said, "We'll be in touch," before heading back to her office. 

Martha and Rose stared after her. 

"Did she just say a baseball bat?" Rose asked. 

"Yeah,” Martha replied. “How the hell do you kill a Dalek with a baseball bat?" 

Rose shook her head. "I have no idea." She turned her attention to Martha. "Everything alright, then?" 

"Yes, we're fine," Martha said and then led them out of A Charitable Earth without further explanation. 

In the car, Rose said, "I'm glad Dorothy could help. It sounds like her safe house is pretty well defended." 

"It does, " Martha said. "And if she can take out a Dalek all on her own, then my family should be in safe hands."

"A baseball bat," Rose muttered. "I can't get over that. Do you think she strapped explosives to it?" 

"Like what a grenade?" Martha pulled them into traffic. 

"I don't know. The Doctor just said she liked explosives." 

"That would've blown her up too," Martha said. 

"True. It must have been modified some other way. God, she's clever." 

"Oh, did you notice she had that terrifying genius grin? The one that’s just like the Doctor's." 

"Yes!" Rose said. "Oh my god, that's where I've seen it before."

She chuckled, and Martha found she could smile again too. 

"We really can't tell the Doctor about her, though," Rose said. "At some point, they do see each other again, but it won't be for another two thousand years in his timeline." 

Two thousand years. God, that was the part Martha still couldn't absorb, and Rose could say it so casually like it meant ‘next week’ or ‘two streets over’.

"Just say she's with UNIT. With her moving in next door, now, she practically will be."

It was a long three hour drive between London and Cardiff, longer still since they had just made the trip up. They chatted a bit as Martha navigated them out of the city, but once they were on the freeway, silence reigned. After watching speeding pavement for a while, Martha’s mind quieted too. It was then that Rose spoke again.

“I didn’t just come back for the Doctor.”

Martha glanced over and then looked back at the road. “Okay,” she said, not really sure what response Rose expected or why she was even saying this.

“And my family will be fine without me,” Rose continued. “They’re happy over there, and they have each other.”

“Really, it’s none of my business.”

“Yet, that doesn’t stop everyone from having an opinion about it,” Rose said with a huff that suggested she wasn’t solely referring to Martha’s heated remarks back at A Charitable Earth. 

Martha wondered if the Doctor was the one with contradictory opinions on Rose giving up her family to stay. Then, she decided that wasn’t her business either.

A moment later, Rose spoke again. “What no one understands is how much being stuck over there felt like dying.”

Martha shot a quick glance towards her, but Rose was staring out her window. “Because you missed him?”

“No. That just hurt,” Rose said. “And the pain gives you something to fight back against; it keeps you alive. But everything else….”

If Martha hadn’t already understood that she and Rose were very different people, she would’ve guessed it now. “What do you mean?”

“The world’s too small after seeing the universe. Don’t you feel it?” Rose continued without waiting for an answer. “Even a parallel world is too small, and Torchwood couldn’t help, much as I pretended it did. It was all the same human problems over and over and over again. Even without the Cybermen, there was always another Lumic devotee trying to build an army, and I just couldn’t stand it.”

Martha still didn’t know who the Cybermen were and she certainly had no idea who Lumic was, but she didn’t interrupt to ask. It didn’t feel relevant to whatever this speech was.

“I don’t know what I would’ve done if the dimension cannon hadn’t started working,” Rose quietly admitted. “I needed to get back to the Doctor -- and yes, it was because I missed him, but I also missed the life he leads. All the travelling and helping people, always seeing and doing more.” Rose sighed. “I needed more.”

Now, Martha grasped Rose’s point. Martha could agree the world was smaller after travelling with the Doctor and seeing all those other planets and time periods -- but Martha had also witnessed, firsthand, the entire world ravaged by an unimaginable apocalypse. With that year thankfully erased, she found it comforting how small and familiar the Earth was. But needing more… that part resonated. Martha was beginning to realize she needed more too: more than using her intergalactic knowledge to help the military, more than living for the hope that she’ll feel whole and happy again one day. Unlike Rose, travelling with the Doctor again wasn’t the answer. Unfortunately, Martha didn’t know what her answer was yet.

“You were suffocating over there.”

“Yeah,” Rose said, a little desperate, a little eager that Martha might understand after all.

Martha nodded. “I think I get that.”

The rest of the drive passed in silence. It was past seven by the time they reached UNIT’s Cardiff base. Martha and Rose exchanged phone numbers to keep in touch followed by goodbyes that were more tired but less awkward than their hellos. Then, Rose headed for Torchwood’s SUV with an exaggerated expression of dread that made Martha smirk while Martha walked towards the entrance to the base and ran through her to-do list. She needed to call Tom and let him know she’d be another night in Cardiff. (Though, she hadn’t received any missed calls or messages from him so he may already suspect this.) She needed to decide how and when to tell her family they would need to go into hiding. Should she call Tish first? Or maybe Leo. He only remembered the one night of laying low, but he’d become surprisingly reliable while the rest of them tried to recover. He’d probably stay the most composed when she told him.

Before she could address her family, though, she needed to finish her autopsy reports and move the bodies from the morgue to storage. Normally, the ritual of finishing a report was soothing. Tonight, it just made her feel sick.

Martha slipped her hand into her pocket for her UNIT badge, but her fingers snagged on Dorothy’s business card. Martha pulled it out and examined the logo.

A-C-E. A Charitable Earth. It was a far cry from Unified Intelligence Taskforce. It suggested less force and more empathy and assistance.

It triggered an idea.

"Hey, Rose."

Rose had been in the process of climbing up into Torchwood’s SUV when Martha called out, but she stepped back down to the parking lot. "Yeah?" 

"That family we found, the ones you knew in your parallel world." Martha tapped the business card against her fingers. "I know the reality bomb is our top priority, but do you think the Doctor might be willing to take them back to their home planet?"

Rose's expression was hard to read, so Martha pushed on. 

"It just feels weird to leave them here when they might have family or friends out there who have no idea what happened to them. And - don't tell him about this - but UNIT does have a code set up specifically for the Doctor to explain when things go missing. So I wouldn't have any problems releasing the bodies to him."

She waited on edge for two long seconds before Rose broke into a soft smile.

"Yeah, I'll ask him,” Rose said. “Thank you." 

If Rose Tyler was asking the Doctor for something, Martha knew the answer would be yes. Some of her tension faded. 

"I'll start up the paperwork."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! You can find me on tumblr @amtrak12.  
> I’ve also created a static page that links the entire “change the currents” series in chronological order since I am definitely not writing them that way. :P


End file.
